


"Courage, dear heart."

by Wingittofreedom



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: ASMR, Asexual Spock (Star Trek), Gray-sexual Spock, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Pining Spock, Romance, Shame, Spock POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-13
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-05-02 08:43:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19195510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wingittofreedom/pseuds/Wingittofreedom
Summary: Spock likes quiet. Jim is loud. A love story meant to be read at whisper-volume.Now aPodfic!





	"Courage, dear heart."

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you yet again to [summerofspock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerofspock/pseuds/summerofspock) for the wonderful beta’ing of this story.  
> If you don’t know what ASMR is, here’s the [wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_sensory_meridian_response).
> 
> UPDATE: Now a PODFIC! Done by the amazing [@eunysloane](https://eunyisadoran.tumblr.com/post/190302116158/courage-dear-heart-for-wingittofreedom-by) Give it a listen [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22314079), her reading voice is amazing.

“Sometimes, when you’re overstimulated, it can be best to just step back, and take some time to relax. Are you relaxing?” asked the soft voice whispering into Spock’s sensitive ears.

At the sound he felt himself relax and a deep, somatic calm permeate his entire body.

“There, that’s better. Are you starting to feel good? Good. I love doing this for you. I love it when you relax like this for me,” the voice continued and Spock felt his mind start to swim with tingles of pleasure.

“You’re always so beautiful. You have such a beautiful soul, it’s blinding. And I’m one of the few people who gets to see it, to be with you when you’re like this,” the voice whispered, as the pleasure Spock was experiencing crescendoed.

“That’s why I love making ASMR videos. Because I get to be such a close, personal friend to all of you.”

***

It had started when Spock was just three.

He’d been sitting in his high chair, watching his mother chop vegetables for dinner and listening to her as she spoke to him in the undulating babble of baby-talk that he already knew he was too old for.

He hadn’t stopped her though, illogical as she was being, and the soft, rhythmic sound of her chopping and the quiet warble of her speech had mingled together in Spock’s mind, making it swim pleasantly like the porcelain flakes in a snow globe.

Spock hadn’t consciously realized what it meant—the fact that he hadn’t stopped his mother that day, despite knowing that she was being illogical—until many years later.

At seven it had happened again, when his parents had left him alone for an afternoon, with plenty of instructions for what to do should something go wrong and comm numbers to call in case of an emergency.

Spock, however, had known his mother’s worry was superfluous. He was seven. He was invincible. He was fully capable of watching over himself and his parents’ property for an afternoon.

Especially because if any burglars did decide to show up, he had his gigantic pet _sehlat_ I-Chaya to help scare them off.

When he had informed his mother of this, she had smiled, which Spock had taken as acknowledgement of these obvious facts.

After his parents had departed, Spock had set up patrol, monitoring the perimeter of the house with I-Chaya at his side, whose head he had festooned with his mothers hat-turned-guard’s-livery.

That was until I-Chaya had become distracted by a stray pillow, at which point the _sehlat_ had ceased his patrol in favor of playing with his new toy.

At first, Spock had attempted to make I-Chaya cease his foolishness and see reason.

But after a few minutes Spock had grown distracted by the sounds I-Chaya’s claws made against the fabric of the pillow.

Despite their enormous size, _sehlats_ were extremely dexterous, and even had semi-prehensile digits. The result was that I-Chaya’s play was almost dainty, the soft scrape of his claws against the cushion soon lulling Spock into silence, and he stood there for an unknown amount of time, listening to I-Chaya play in a state of pleasurable dazedness as tingles ran up and down his spine and brain stem, like warm, glittering water rushing under his scalp.

Eventually I-Chaya had grown tired of playing with the pillow, and he had padded over to Spock, whereupon he began nosing and sniffing at him.

Later Spock deduced that the sniffing was because Spock had eaten _thuhk_ earlier that day—which was one of I-Chaya’s favorite foods (despite the fact that it would kill him in great quantities and he was thus strictly prohibited from attempting to consume it).

But in the moment, the gentle snuffling sound so close to his sensitive ears had caused something that felt like the pleasant fuzz of a circuitry overload to occur in Spock’s brain.

And then I-Chaya licked his face with his wet, slobbery tongue and it was over in an instant and Spock had needed to chide I-Chaya for his great rudeness.

But unlike when Spock had been three, at seven he was scientist enough to be both aware and curious as to what had happened to him in the moments prior.

Consequently, the following day Spock had staged an experiment: after ingesting more _thuhk_ he had positioned himself close to I-Chaya and waited to see what would happen.

To his surprise, an almost identical process occurred: at the sounds of I-Chaya’s snuffles, Spock again experienced what felt like the slow melting of the uncomfortable, prickly parts of his brain—the parts which should have reminded him that what he was doing was illogical—but without which he was left with nothing but the experience of complete and total contentment. 

Predictably, the experiment was brought to an abrupt and ill-mannered halt, with Spock being slobbered on and I-Chaya being shamed into repentance. But it had been enough for Spock to confirm that what had happened to him the day before had not been a fluke.

After that Spock began to actively search for the sounds that triggered the snow-globe feeling wherever he could.

And they were everywhere on Vulcan, he soon discovered.

Vulcans did everything so quietly.

It was something he had never before appreciated about his father’s species—but now, it quickly became one of his favorite characteristics about his people—the fellow classmates, teachers and inhabitants of Shi’Khar who now became unknowing sources of the starbursts in Spock’s head.

The susurrus sound of Vulcan robes swishing as a procession of professors walked in stately slowness across the floor of a lecture hall; the quiet brush of his Vulcan martial arts teachers skimming their dry limbs together as they demonstrated new positions of the _suus mahna_ ; the clipped pronunciation of Golic as it was spoken by the vendors and purchasers in tea shops and market transactions; the circumspect way that Vulcans moved their hands when performing tasks and the carefulness with which they handled objects; the sounds of other students, murmuring answers in their pods after Spock had completed his lessons for the day; even the dry rasp of Vulcan’s ever-blowing wind against his shutters as Spock fell asleep each night.

Each of these sounds flooded Spock with that same feeling of quiet euphoria—like a mild electric current running through his brain—temporarily silencing the logical part of his mind and allowing him to experience the world around him for all its calm and potent beauty.

Apart from his mother, and the climate, these sounds were what Spock missed most when he left Vulcan for Earth to join Starfleet—after it became clear that staying on Vulcan would only mean his slow submission into a forced acceptance of his status as a permanent second-class citizen, always degraded and reviled for his twained genetics.

Earth promised freedom from expectations, a new opportunity to start over where none knew him, a chance at a fulfilling life, and the possibility of electing his own destiny.

Earth, it turned out, was loud.

Unlike Vulcans, humans seemed almost to enjoy the riotous cacophony of noises that they voluntarily surrounded themselves with; the blaring of sirens, the shouts of passersby, the honking of horns, the unnecessarily loud voices and equally loud emotions, the careless laughter, the droning of air-vehicles and the screeching of tires.

Spock found these harsh, discordant sounds irritating and they made conversing with many of his human classmates difficult and occasionally unpleasant.

Some of this discomfort was mitigated when Spock discovered the Home Shopping Network channel on his roomates’ television. And at first his only recourse was staying up late into the night watching as soft-spoken women talked about the carefully-held jewelry they were selling in detailed, intricate, precious ways that gave Spock blissful tingles.

Eventually though, it was the very unpleasantness of the human propensity for noise that finally drove Spock to research and understand his peculiar sensitivity to sound.

Previously, the only place he had ever found anything referencing the sensation he experienced was in a few lines of Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. _Dalloway_ when a nursemaid was described as speaking to her patient “deeply, softly, like a mellow organ, but with a roughness in her voice like a grasshopper's, which rasped his spine deliciously and sent running up into his brain waves of sound.” 

Hence he had always assumed that his condition was unique, or nearly so.

But his research quickly lead him to discover that this was far from the case.

What Spock had always thought was an anomalous quirk of his brain’s chemistry turns out to have a name—“autonomous sensory meridian response” (usually referred to by the acronym ASMR)—and a whole internet following of devotees, enthusiasts and practitioners across various species.

This revelation opened a new world for Spock.

No longer would he be forced to listen to the constant sounds of traffic that never seemed to cease, even in the middle of the night when he was attempting to sleep or early morning when he was attempting to practice the _suus mahna._

Instead, armed with his new wonderful new knowledge, Spock located a pair of noise-cancelling headphones and then lay on his bed while he searched for ASMR videos to experiment.

There were thousands of them. So Spock (a long time advocate of Occam's razor) just clicked the first one, which was titled “ASMR word repetitions” and featured a young Orion woman whispering certain words over and over again—wonderful words like “blush,” “honeycomb,” and “checkers,”—the sound of which made Spock’s eyelids flutter and his eyes go unfocused, his mind feeling like it was turning into carbonated champagne bubbles.

After that, Spock used the videos to fall asleep most nights or just to relax when he was overwhelmed by the wash of human emotion and noise that he was constantly surrounded by—lulled into a state of bliss by ASMR whisperers who did everything from tapping their nails against various surfaces to brushing their microphones with cosmetic brushes while they whisper intoxicating words like “stipple,” “whiskey” and “enchantment.”

When Spock met Nyota in his second year as a professor, he fell for the delicate way she handled her jewelry, the quiet swish of her hair and the beautiful way she pronounced the consonants from the nineteen different languages that she spoke.

Barely had they begun to make their confused, stumbling, and perhaps inappropriate feelings for one another known however, when a cadet hacked the _Kobayashi Maru_ and Starfleet received a distress call from Vulcan during the subsequent academic hearing.

In the chaos and horror that followed, Spock learned several truths about himself and the universe. The universe he’d _thought_ he’d been living in up until the moment he’d felt his planet crumble beneath his feet as he watched his mother fall away into the nothingness. Nothingness that he was still reaching into when he rematerialized, seconds later on the transporter pad.

These truths were difficult, and ranged from the inconsequential to the quite literally earth shattering.

First, Spock discovered that despite what he’d told himself when he left Vulcan all those years ago—that he never wanted to return, that he wouldn’t regret never setting foot there again, or never again looking into the faces of the people who had once tormented him—were completely false, delusional and no better than lies.

Spock missed everything.

Even the parts that he had hated.

Another truth that Spock discovered in the dizzying, nauseous shock of it all was that he and Nyota were not suited for each other.

The kiss they shared felt wrong and he could tell from her eyes that she knew it to.

Another, almost equally unpleasant discovery was the existence of James T. Kirk. Specifically, that he was loud.

It had only been a passing observation at first—made when the cadet had burst onto the bridge and yelled for the _Enterprise_ to stop, stop now, at all costs during the middle of a rescue mission—reaffirmed later when Kirk had broken into his personal space and shouted painful, infuriating things at him: that Spock didn’t feel, wasn’t human, had never loved his mother—things that make him snap, lose his temper and try to hurt someone for the first time in over a decade.

And after everything was said and done—after he and Kirk had infiltrated the _Narada_ , saved Pike and then watched together as Nero’s ship was consumed by a black hole that might as well have been born from Nero’s own hate and vengeful megalomania—the observation of Kirk’s loudness was confirmed with unshakable certainty.

So it was with hesitancy, reluctance and some outright disbelief that Spock accepted the advice of his older self, and renewed his commission as Kirk’s First Officer aboard the _Enterprise._

And for the first several weeks, Spock’s opinion of Kirk did not change.

Indeed Kirk seemed to be a singularly unquiet individual—not only loud wherever he went (on the bridge, in the mess, in the corridors) but also constantly in motion, jogging if he was supposed to be walking, pacing when he was supposed to be standing, and tapping his foot, fingers or whole leg when he was supposed to be sitting still.

Spock found all of these habits to be terribly distracting, excessive and seemingly almost calculated to annoy him in all the ways that he was most easily annoyed.

But then the Captain invited him to play chess one day after shift, and Spock—although he was not eager to spent a protracted period of time in this loud man’s company—acquiesced on the premise that it would be rude not to, and perhaps on the faint hope that his counterpart from another universe knew something he didn’t.

And James T. Kirk _was_ loud—that inalterable fact didn’t change—was downright boisterous when he showed Spock into his quarters and offered him tea.

But, it turned out, James T. Kirk could also be quiet.

Quiet in the way he set a teacup by Spock’s hand, filled with _cha’al_ , Spock’s favorite tea, and gave him a smile that wasn’t shy but was tinged with something like shyness.

Quiet in the way he examined the board, his thumb rubbing against his chin and the occasional hum escaping his lips as he considered his next move.

Quiet in the steady, sure way that he handled the chess pieces and the soft clinks they made when he set them down or used them to capture Spock’s pieces.

As they played, those gentle clicking sounds soon had Spock’s mind unspooling into calm and then, to Spock’s surprise, into tingles of pleasure.

If Jim noticed his abstraction though, he didn’t say anything and they continued to play until Spock tipped Jim’s king, and Jim grinned at him and asked for a rematch.

After that, playing chess with Jim Kirk quickly became Spock’s favorite source of relaxation, his favorite source of the pleasurable sensations that calmed his mind and turned it into a snow globe—and he soon began seeking out these games whenever Jim was available.

Perhaps because of Spock’s eagerness, or Jim’s bemused willingness to accommodate him, chess games after shift quickly turned into catching up on paperwork together, eating meals together, or simply being in the same room together—Jim turning the pages of the paperback novels he secretly loved to read while Spock pretended to examine his PADD, mind dissolving into starbursts at the sound of Jim’s hands brushing, turning and handling the pages of his book.

Over the time they spent together and the quiet conversations they sometimes had, Spock slowly pieced together an explanation for Jim’s loudness and his near constant motion. Jim was loud because no one had ever listened to him as a child, and constantly moving because he’d spent his youth running away from people who wanted to hurt him, (including Jim himself).

And Spock forgave him these things—his loudness and his motion—and even came to cherish them as signs of Jim’s ever-present desire to live, to thrive and never give up despite whatever odds he faced.

And once Spock understood and forgave, it was impossible for him not to love. To desire to be loved by this man who never gave up on himself, on Spock, on anyone or anything he thought was worthwhile.

It was a feeling Spock didn't know how to put into words, something he wasn’t sure of the meaning of since he’d never experienced anything exactly like it before—the desire to be with someone as often as he could, to care for them when they were in pain, to be the cause of their smiles and to ensure their well-being and happiness.

After Spock became aware of his feelings, spending time with Jim became conversely more enjoyable and more painful.

More enjoyable because each moment spent in Jim’s company was all the more treasured and significant. And more painful because Spock didn't know how to tell Jim any of this without disrupting their otherwise flourishing friendship.

And so all Spock’s words stayed quiet inside of him, gentle noises that he hadn’t found a way to give voice to just yet.

“What were you listening to?” Jim asked him one evening, after Spock had finished meditating in Jim’s ‘living room’ while Jim completed some “pointless-asinine-busywork-bullshit-paperwork” at his desk.

Spock, who had been listening to an ASMR video in which the practitioner had whispered to him that he was special and loved, didn’t knew how to respond.

He had never explained his ASMR to anyone before after all.

“That’s okay,” Jim continued after a moment. “You don’t have to tell me. I’ve always liked to believe that when you said ‘meditating,’ you were really just rocking out to Metallica or something, and I kind of don’t want that Vulcan metal-head fantasy spoiled.”

Spock, feeling grateful, if slightly conflicted, had responded in kind and the matter had been dismissed.

Later that night, however, when he was alone in his own quarters and lying on his bed in the dark, Spock wondered what it would be like to tell Jim about his ASMR, tell him that Jim himself was his favorite trigger.

He imagined out how maybe such a conversation could lead to a revelation of Spock’s own, deeper feelings and that perhaps— _just maybe,_ he fantasized—a similar confession from Jim.

Spock rolled over on his side, pushing the siren’s tune of tempting thought away.

Jim didn't think of him in that way. For one thing, Spock had hardly been in one romantic relationship, while he was painfully aware that Jim had been party to many tens, if not hundreds of trysts and would likely expect many emotional and sexual acts that Spock would be incapable of providing.

And Spock was not even sure if he wanted to have sex.

Ever.

Even with Jim.

Despite his half-humanness, and the overt sexuality displayed by many of his human peers, Spock had never wanted to have sex. And although he _had_ experienced arousal, it was always fleeting and transitory, and Spock had never given much heed to its sporadic coming and goings.

Because of his lack of sexual desire, Spock had long since come to understand that he was almost certainly like most Vulcans—largely asexual except during _pon farr_.

It was an article of self-knowledge that never used to trouble him.

Except now it did.

Now, he found himself wondering what Jim might expect from him if, by some miracle, Jim reciprocated some of Spock’s own feelings of indefinable want.

He at first wondered, and then grew certain that Jim—if he were to accept a romantic overture from Spock—would be more amenable to such a relationship if Spock could fulfill his sexual needs.

In this way love, doubt and despair led Spock to do embarrassing research and then, to a decision to attempt to encourage one of the brief moments of arousal he occasionally experienced alone in his quarters.

Accordingly, one night several weeks later, he sat in on the edge of his bed on top of the covers with his PADD, searching the internet for pornography for the first time in his life.

It felt wrong.

Without even watching the videos, the still images alone were too much—too disturbing and violent and repellant—and he quickly closed the website.

He was very close to shutting off his PADD too and giving up the whole enterprise in disgust.

But he didn’t.

Spock was determined to try, because he knew of what very little he had to offer Jim in a relationship, he would have even less if he could not complete this seemingly simple, physical act.

So he searched again, at last finding a clip. Not pornography, but simply a small excerpt of a black and white movie that showed a man and a woman kissing repeatedly as they embraced one another for several long minutes.

Although he felt slightly disquieted at the voyeurism of what he was doing, there was so much intimacy in the act that, when he focused on it, he began to feel a stirring of warmth. Warmth which slid into flickering arousal as he watched the almost magnetic way in which the man and woman stayed close to one another, murmuring to one another, their faces separated by mere centimeters as they continued to close the distance again and again with soft kisses over the course of several minutes.

And instead of simply ignoring the arousal or allowing it to pass away as he usually would, Spock drew his fingers slowly across his own lips, imagining that they were someone else’s. Then he closed his eyes and touched his own mouth a second time, pretending that someone else was kissing him.

He ran his other hand down the side of his neck, over his own shoulder and down his arm, feeling the arousal grow.

But when he tried to approach his groin, he felt shooting anxiety instead of pleasure. He clenched his jaw and attempted to touch himself anyway. It could not be so difficult, humans did this all the time. It could not be so difficult, it could not—

Tears started rolling down Spock’s face as he tried to touch himself and felt nothing but unpleasantness and shame.

He felt broken.

Like a defective hybrid failure, incapable of something so seemingly fundamental. Incapable of participating in a normal relationship. Incapable of what Jim would want and expect.

Just then he heard the soft buzz of his comm. Shutting off his PADD, he pushed it to the end of his bed, sitting up and wiping his face with his sleeve.

“Enter,” he said, after he had ensured that his face was dry.

It was Jim, of course.

“Hey Spock, I was just coming to ask you—” Jim broke off as he looked up from his comm.

“Spock, are you alright?” he asked quietly, looking concerned and stepping further into the room.

Spock widened his eyes, looking up at Jim and attempting to control his emotions.

_I am in control of my emotions. I am in control of—_

But it was too much, too soon after what had just happened, and with horror, he felt another tear slide down his cheek and he was powerless to stop those that followed.

With sure motions, Jim strode towards him, sitting down on the bed and putting his arms around Spock.

A moment later a hand was carding through his hair and another was running gently up and down his back, for now it not mattering that Spock hadn’t told him what was wrong, was simply crying on him, Jim making quiet shushing noises as Spock silently sobbed against his chest, shuddering slightly every time he remembered what had just occurred.

“It’s okay baby. Hey, it’s okay,” Jim was murmuring, “It’s alright, I’m here.” 

Eventually Spock regained himself enough to draw back and sit up. Jim looked at him with searching blue eyes.

Spock opened his mouth to try to explain, but he didn’t know where to begin so it came out as a foolish stutter. “I—Jim—I—” he tried.

“It’s fine, just take a deep breath,” Jim said, moving his hands to Spock’s shoulders and gently rubbing them with the palms of his wide, strong hands.

Spock took a deep breath, and felt himself relax a bit more.

“Good,” Jim said, his cheeks lifting in a small smile. “Now why don’t you start at the beginning?”

"It is...a long story," Spock said.

"I'm listening."

It wasn't an order, but Spock obeyed anyway. Slowly. He told Jim about when he was three, and how listening to his mother chop vegetables and murmur to him in baby talk had made his head feel like a snow globe.

He told Jim about when he was seven and his novice experiment with I-Chaya and the _thuhk_ , which made Jim laugh.

He told Jim about the research he had done when he had first arrived on Earth, about ASMR, explaining that it was a form of auditory-tactile synesthesia experienced as frisson in the brain.

At this point Jim nodded, and a look of understanding gleaming in his eye.

“I’ve heard of that before—I had a girlfriend once who was into it. I tried it though and I didn’t feel anything.”

Spock felt a sweep of relief that he would not have to explain any further but then Jim asked, “But that doesn’t explain what this was about,” he said, patting Spock’s bed. “I want to know if you’ll tell me.”

Spock took another deep breath, preparing himself for the reality of the conversation he had imagined so many times.

He found he couldn’t do so sitting so close to Jim, so he pulled back, sliding away until his back was against the bulkhead which adjoined his bed.

Jim turned to look at him, his face expectant.

“Jim, this is…I find it difficult to speak of this.” He swallowed. “But it was incumbent on me to do so. It has been disingenuous of me to spend time in your company without informing you that you—you—” He stuttered, getting hung up on the word like a hiccup while Jim kept looking at him with his beautiful, patient eyes. “You trigger my ASMR,” he finally got out.

Jim’s eyes widened fractionally, and Spock continued before he could interrupt. “It had also been disingenuous of me to feel what I feel for you and not to have informed you of it.”

“Feel for me?” Jim asked, his eyes suddenly blazing with an unknown emotion.

Spock nodded. “For several months I have harbored what could be described as—amorous feelings towards your person,” Spock said in his most emotionless monotone, each word feeling like a death knell.

“Wait, no exact break down of seconds on that?” Jim said, his face splitting into a wide grin. “Spock if that’s you telling me you love me, then this,” Jim said, holding out two fingers in what Spock recognized instantly as the _ozh’esta_ , “is me telling you it’s reciprocated. Definitely. Has been for a while actually."

Spock stared at the two fingers being proffered to him, totally disbelieving what his eyes and conscious mind were telling him, unable to move, and eventually Jim lowered the fingers again, looking unsure.

“If that’s not what you were saying though—” he began, and Spock cut him off.

“No. You have not misinterpreted my statement—only I must also inform you that I do not think a romantic relationship between us would be viable.” Each word was like an anvil on his tongue.

At this, Jim’s brows furrowed in confusion, and a trace of that stubborn look flitted cross his face. The one Spock saw so often on the bridge or on alien planets—the ‘I don’t believe in no-win scenarios' look.

“I don’t see why not. I love you, you love me—that’s grounds for a romantic relationship as far as I'm concerned.”

Spock considered whether to evade the proverbial elephant in the room. The elephant that apparently only he knew about—and simply continuing with whatever Jim had in mind for as long as he could.

After all, from his research Spock was aware that they could reasonably be expected to go on for days or weeks, or perhaps even months before he would be required to have sex.

He could have Jim during that time, have all of him, as he’d wanted for so long. All he had to do was stay quiet.

“Jim, I must inform you of something,” Spock heard himself say. “I cannot enter into a relationship with you under false pretenses or make tacit promises to you regarding physical intimacy which I will almost certainly be unable to keep.”

“Physical intimacy—wait, are you talking about sex?” Jim asked, his dynamic face clouding in confusion.

Spock nodded silently, feeling miserable in the knowledge that he had given up any opportunity to experience the bright, attractive man in front of him in a romantic context.

“So by ‘promises you’d be unable to keep’ do you mean you don’t want to have sex?” Jim tilted his head to the side. “Are you telling me you’re asexual?”

Spock felt his heart thump in his side and he rallied himself to respond. “I do not know,” he said. “I have never engaged in—” Spock broke off before trying again. “The reason behind my earlier loss of control was that, prior to you requesting entry, I was attempting to determine this myself.”

“What does—” Jim began, and then his eyes widened as Spock turns on his PADD, tilting it so that Jim could see the paused clip of the man and woman.

“Oh,” Jim breathed, and Spock felt his heart plummet like a stone.

“I am aware that you are used to partners with much more experience than I, and—”

“Wait, hold on. What exactly have you heard about my partners?” Jim asked, his brow furrowing again. “Wait, don’t answer that. I can make a pretty good guess. You’ve heard that I’m some sort of intergalactic playboy who never sleeps with the same person twice right?”

Spock regarded him silently, and Jim sighed.

“Should've quashed those rumors when I had the chance,” he muttered.

And then to Spock he said “Look, I know what people say and it’s not exactly how they make it out. Yes, I’ve had sex with a lot of people. That’s true and I can’t lie to you about that. But the rest of it—” Jim waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. “Honestly a lot of it was awful, when I was feeling like shit or I was drunk or I was trying to self-destruct—I mean, having lots of sex was fine and slut shaming was terrible but—”

Here Jim sighed again, frustrated. “My point is, my sexual history isn’t something I’m _proud_ of or that I get to hold over your head because you’re inexperienced or whatever. I don’t think about it like that and you shouldn’t either.”

Spock breathed in, feeling a tiny part of his anxiety slide away. The rest remained resolutely intact, as looming and inescapable as ever. So Spock tried again to give voice to it—to make Jim see reason.

“Jim, what if I am never able to reciprocate you sexually? You cannot tell me you desire to be in a relationship that might amount to nothing but celibacy for you.”

Jim looked at him, assessing, with his _“I don’t believe in no-win scenario”_ eyes gleaming a stubborn blue.

“So that video,” Jim said, pointing at Spock’s computer. “Did you enjoy it?”

Spock's face flushed with embarrassment, but he dipped his head in a nod.

He _had_ enjoyed it after all. At first it had felt good, before he had tried to push too far.

“Alright then,” Jim said, nodding and looking satisfied. “I’m obviously not sure, but it sounds you’re on the gray-sexual spectrum. Like you enjoy some things—like maybe kissing and certain kinds of touching—but not other things, like actual full on sex?”

Spock thought about that for several moments and then nodded his assent, still blushing. “I believe your assessment to be accurate however I do not know to what extent I am capable of reciprocating, and I doubt that it will be compatible with your desires," Spock informed him, his heart heavy but a small glimmer of hope beginning to fight its way through.

Jim gave him a look that was half empathy, half _‘no, you’re not getting out of this that easily.’_

“Spock, sex isn't the be-all-end-all in relationships—” Jim smiled self-deprecatingly "—if that were the case I'd be married. Or at least have had something last longer than a few months. So believe me when I say there are much, much more important things to being with someone. For one, I trust you more than anyone I've ever known. And I'm in love with you," Jim said. "If sex isn’t something we ever do, then I’ll be okay.” At this point, Spock raised an eyebrow in disbelief and Jim grinned at him.

“I won’t lie and tell you I don’t enjoy sex or that you don’t turn me on—because you do—but I’ve been in plenty of relationships with great sex and I can barely remember those people’s names and other relationships where the sex was destructive and painful. That's, uh, why I cut down on having sex a few years ago," Jim said, looking uncomfortable. "Well, that and being a captain. It was fucking me up too much. But with you it’s not like that. You’re more important to me than sex. And if you never want to do it because it'd make you uncomfortable, then I don’t want to do it either because—because I want what _you_ want,” Jim finished looking confused. “I think that’s what love was right?"

Spock’s heart started to beat faster in his side and he nodded again. That was exactly how he felt about Jim.

Jim smiled and held out his two fingers to Spock, a questioning look in his eyes.

Spock answered that look by moving two of his own fingers to slide against Jim’s, his whole hand trembling as he did so.

When their fingers brushed together though, Spock felt no discomfort. Only the joy of wanting to be close to Jim, to give as much as he could, and the telepathic echo of a twin emotion humming under Jim’s skin.

Jim’s smile grew.

“I can be patient. We’ll find it all out together,” he whispered, and his mouth looked so nice that Spock leaned in slowly to attempt a human kiss like the one in the video.

As he did, he felt Jim’s intake of breath and watched Jim’s eyes widen, dilate ever so slightly, and then flutter closed as Spock placed a small, close-mouthed kiss on his lips before drawing back.

Jim looked at him with a slightly dazed expression.

“Do you—do you think I could stay here tonight?” Jim asked, looking uncharacteristically flustered and pink in the face.

“Yes Jim,” Spock said with a small smile, heart beating hard as he got up to put on his pajamas and brush his teeth.

After they had both gotten into pajamas—Jim darting back to his own room for his through their bathroom—and brushed their teeth, they got into Spock's bed and turned off the lights.

“Is this okay?” Jim asked, putting an arm around Spock’s waist. Spock responded by wrapping his own arms around Jim, who let out a soft gasp, drawing him closer.

And despite the rumors and the occasional snicker, that is all Jim and Spock did.

Although he was aware that everyone—from their crew (when their relationship became known to the ship after several weeks), to the Admiralty (when they filed their relationship status with Starfleet after several months) and perhaps the whole world (when they were bonded on Vulcan after several years)—think they knew what he and Jim did behind closed doors, Spock was content to lie in bed with Jim as they held each other, Spock listening to the soft beating of Jim’s heart and the quiet sounds of Jim whispering that he loved him in his ear.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to learn more about ASMR, [here](https://www.thisamericanlife.org/491/tribes/act-two) is the This American Life episode blip that inspired this story.
> 
> I’m still working on my longer story (!!!) so stay tuned/subscribe. Follow me at [@wingittofreedom](https://wingittofreedom.tumblr.com) and reblog [this post](https://wingittofreedom.tumblr.com/post/185644297014/courage-dear-heart-star-trek-alternate) if you'd like others to find this!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] "Courage, dear heart."](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22314079) by [Euny_Sloane](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Euny_Sloane/pseuds/Euny_Sloane)




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